Chicago

Judith

A Jewish heroine whose legendary feats are told in the apocryphal book (late 1st cent. BCE) bearing her name. She assassinates the Assyrian general Holofernes, but the book contains a mixture of allusions to Assyrian, Babylonian, and Persian eras with several historical errors: Nebuchadnezzar’s capital city was not Nineveh (1: 1) and Ecbatana was captured by Cyrus in 550 BCE, not by Nebuchadnezzar (1: 14), and may be a 2nd-cent. BCE comment on Maccabean political ambitions. In the story, Judith returns home after her victory (Judith 16: 21), which could be a hint or warning to the Maccabeans: another Deborah (Judg. 5) has delivered Israel! There are probably Maccabaean allusions e.g. to the death of Holofernes (13: 8) which recalls the beheading of Nicanor (1 Macc. 7: 47). There is a powerful painting of Judith holding aloft the head of Holofernes by Gustave Doré (1832–83) in Swansea, South Wales, but many painters of the Renaissance were attracted to the gruesome scene, including Michelangelo,
in the Sistine Chapel.